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Blaming a falloff in CD sales on the popularity of CD burners, BMG">http://www.bmg.de/">BMG Germany recently issued approximately 100,000 copy-protected discs in an attempt to thwart the problem—and had to take a substantial portion of them back because consumers said the discs wouldn't perform in car players and in some home audio systems.

Spring typically sees Stereophile release its coveted "Records To Die For" feature, wherein everybody working for the magazine gets to make like a music critic and add their two cents about what gets them excited (musically speaking). R2D4 2000 is on newsstands right now, in the February issue of Stereophile; to commemorate its publication, we add the 1999">http://www.stereophile.com//records2die4/199/">1999 "Records To Die For" to the online archives.

Visitors to the Listen.comhttp://www.listen.com">Listen.com; website will find a headline on the home page: "Your Guide to MP3 and More." MP3 recordings, while a big hit with young music fans, have not been a favorite of the music business. The key to Listen.com's financial future as a download site is likely whatever ends up falling under "and more."

The Home Entertainment 2000 show, originally planned to be held in Rye, New York this spring, has been canceled. Show staff has received feedback from manufacturers and dealers, who feel that the rooms at the Rye venue are too small, and that a suburban location is not optimal. EmapUSA VP Jaqueline Augustine states that "We want to hold a successful show, and this venue could not guarantee our success."

There's not a lot of music in the bottom octave, and there's not a lot of information in the low bass of a movie soundtrack. But there is a lot of power down there in the rumbling subterranean region—power that adds palpable realism to every type of home entertainment. That's why we go to extremes in our search for low-frequency reinforcement: full-range loudspeakers, and multiple subwoofers, and digital room-correction systems.

What began as a seemingly random collection of songs became a classic animated movie. Yellow Submarine was recently remastered and reissued on DVD and CD, and has now become the latest in a string of virtual-reality theme-park rides: Beatles fans visiting Berlin's Potsdamer Platz can travel through Pepperland at The Beatles' Yellow Submarine Adventure.

Last week, Command">http://www.commandaudio.com">Command Audio announced $56 million in new funding from several media, technology, and venture capital companies for its audio-on-demand service. The company says that the new funding will help fuel the rollout of their entertainment and information service to major US markets in the coming year.